


Sunday Supper

by athenejen



Category: Eight Days of Luke - Diana Wynne Jones
Genre: Domestic, F/M, Gen, Post-Book, Yuletide, Yuletide 2011, chosen family
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-22
Updated: 2011-12-22
Packaged: 2017-10-27 21:28:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,993
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/300224
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/athenejen/pseuds/athenejen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which three humans and four mythological figures enjoy some food and conversation.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sunday Supper

**Author's Note:**

  * For [hhertzof](https://archiveofourown.org/users/hhertzof/gifts).



> Many thanks to my wonderful beta!

When Astrid was at university, her favourite class had been Comparative Folklore and Mythology. She'd picked it out of the course listing solely to spite her mother—who had wanted her to take home economics instead, something _useful_ for when she got married, and shouldn't she have found a young man by now, dear?—and her father—who simply wanted her to finish as quickly as possible so as to stop wasting his money on this newfangled women's education nonsense, and couldn't comprehend why she would want to take something outside of her exceedingly boring secretarial classes in any case—and on the first day had been delighted to discover that the professor was of the rather youngish and quite handsome type, with a warm, melodious voice and distractingly engaging smile. Even more delightful was the subject matter, and by the end of term, her high marks had only a very little to do with wanting to impress Professor Thomsen.

Maybe she should have been more surprised when that class ended up being the one most applicable to her life, but in some odd, subtle way, it seemed completely natural from the first and just continued on like that, simple as you please. It helped that it made the decade in between seem almost like a bad dream whose time has past, gone forever. The Norse gods had brought a heap of trouble and complication, but also excitement and more laughter than she'd had in years, and furthermore the thing she had apparently needed most without even realizing it, true companionship. Though that was really on David more than the gods, even if the ones like Luke—and those who came round to visit now that Luke was out of prison for good and hung about the flat more often than not—did count too.

If she were honest with herself, and after years and years of wrapping herself in the cotton-wool of misery and peevishness she certainly tried to be, some of them counted for even more than that. But still, so much came back to David, and that moment she realized he was a person and not just a _relation_ , and then the week afterwards when, even in the midst of befriending gods and solving impossible tasks, he seemed to realize it back.

She'd forgotten what it was like to have someone to count on and who counted on her back. Possibly she'd never known. But now, she and David lived in the top-floor rooms above Alan and his mother and his gaggle of sisters, managing quite well between Astrid's office job salary and the modest amount of David's money that kindly, determined Mr. Fry had managed to wrestle out of the banks while the investigation into Ronald and Bernard continued on, likely for years. David switched to Alan's school and was clearly blissfully happy, even when their cricket team lost. Astrid's headaches still plagued her at times, but they seemed much easier to ignore now, even through the rapid click-clack of the typewriter keys as she took dictation.

And just about every Sunday afternoon, gods and goddesses—and the occasional mythic hero, heroine, demigod, raven and so on—gathered in their rooms for supper. The crowd varied, but it always started with Luke.

This particular day was unseasonably chilly and dampish and grey, almost a preview of autumn, but Astrid hummed happily to herself as she made lemonade and set out the tea things. David was in his mess of a room, listening to cricket commentary on the radio and studying maths, after having spent the morning knocking about in the basement with Alan. Astrid had not realized until this year just how bright David was. Perhaps it was that Ronald and Bernard and Dot had made everything so very dull, including herself, so he had seemed dull as well. She still felt quite ashamed about how she had joined the others in treating him badly, but there was nothing for it but to do better now.

She spent a few minutes pondering whether David might prefer to go to London or the Gower Peninsula on holiday, until she was interrupted by the sound of Luke pounding up the stairs. He burst into the sitting room as David skidded in from the hall, just in time to catch the large round loaf of bread Luke tossed at his head.

"Luke!" Astrid admonished him, though she was unable to keep the affection out of her voice. "What if he hadn't caught it?"

Luke grinned his most irrepressible grin at her. "Why, we'd just have to make do with cheese," he said, handing her a large hunk of it wrapped in greaseproof paper. "Besides, David always catches it."

"Not all of us have the same faith in David that you do," Astrid teased, smiling at David to show she didn't mean it one bit.

"Well, you should," Luke declared, and flopped into the nearest chair, before popping right back up again and turning to David. "Where's Alan? I have a new idea for how we can ditch his sisters tomorrow after school, but it's going to take some planning in advance."

"Brilliant!" David beamed and handed Astrid the bread. "He's in the basement—we'll be back upstairs in a few."

"Well the bread will have magically sliced itself by then, I'm sure," Astrid said as they thundered down the stairs, but she didn't really mind. She took the bread and cheese down to the kitchen to slice, humming again as she went.

Halfway through the loaf, the doorbell rang, and Astrid set down the bread knife to go and open the door.

Sigyn was standing there holding a plate of small cakes, and with her was one of the valkyries, the one who spent most of her time as Woden's chauffeur. The jar of raspberry jam she handed to Astrid seemed incongruous.

"I'm Svipul," she said, smiling and offering Astrid her hand to shake. "I hope you don't mind, I invited myself along when Sigyn said she was coming here today. I was rooting for David, you know. Smart kid, that one."

"And he knows it, too," Astrid said, smiling back. Svipul's grip was smooth, her handshake firm. Astrid held the door open and gestured them inside. "Please do come in; any friend of Sigyn and Luke's is welcome here."

Just then, Luke and David and Alan came back up from the basement. "Svipul!" Luke didn't sound surprised to see her, but he did sound happy. "Glad you came. No Woden today, looks like. Good, last time he ate all the cakes."

"Not quite _all_ the cakes," said Sigyn, smiling at Luke.

"He did, too," David broke in. "Well, except for the ones the ravens ate. And then he and Luke got in an argument about Gefjun until Thor made them both shut up by putting on the new Indigo Rubber album and turning it up really loud."

"And then my mum came up and kicked everyone out!" Alan ended the story with a flourish. Svipul burst out laughing, and Alan looked rather pleased with himself.

The doorbell rang again.

"Speaking of Thor," said Sigyn, and went to answer the door.

"Let's go upstairs," David suggested when Sigyn came back, Thor in tow. "You don't have to slice the rest of the bread, Astrid, we can just break off chunks."

So they all trooped upstairs and crowded around the little sitting room's coffee table. Thor unwrapped the thick slices of cold roast beef he'd brought and put them on the platter with Luke's cheese, Luke kindled a fire in the grate, and all of them dug into supper.

"I say," said David to Svipul, taking a big bite of bread and meat and cheese, "do you think we could ever get Sigurd to come to supper sometime? He was nice."

Svipul looked thoughtful. "Well, he's not really supposed to leave Wallsey. I'm not even sure he would want to leave, even for an afternoon."

"Why not?" David asked. "The arcade looked fun, but if I were him, I'd want to come out sometimes, too. If we could go there, why couldn't he come here?"

Sigyn and Svipul exchanged looks, but it was Thor who spoke. "There are some things that are easier to forget if you stay in one place."

"But—"

"And there are some things it would be better to forget," Luke added, sounding sad.

"But—"

"David," interrupted Alan, his voice as placid as ever. "What strategy do you think we should use in our match against Larwood House this week?"

David looked mutinous for only a moment before turning willingly to talk of cricket with Alan. Thor joined in, though David kept having to explain the meaning of all the terms—wickets and runs and bowling and such appeared to mostly make sense, but the seriousness of placing a fielder at silly point seemed to particularly confuse him, as did the lack of women on the field during a maiden over.

Sigyn touched Luke's knee with her hand, and if his smile started out small, after a few seconds it became Luke's usual blinding grin. He jumped up and went to talk about cricket, while Sigyn and Astrid and Svipul began an animated conversation about their jobs. Sigyn had taken on some hours working as a nurse at Thunderly Hill, and from her descriptions of some of the doctors it was a wonder that anyone ever ended up healed! Of course, that was still less disturbing than the obvious gaps in Svipul's story about the time she drove Woden through Wantchester.

Astrid, in turn, told them all about the other typists in her office, and how she and her boss had decided to fix one of them up with the junior accountant who'd just joined the company. Her boss proposed locking them in the storage closet together, but Astrid thought perhaps that taking Anthea shopping for a new work wardrobe might be a better first step.

This led, as these things do, to an extended conversation about current fashions, and Astrid had just brought up the haircut the receptionist at her office had got and was wondering if she should think about something similar, when Thor boomed out, "No!"

Astrid looked up, startled, to find that he was looking right at her. "I beg your pardon?"

"That is," he said more quietly, "I like your hair how it is." A flush crept up his neck and spread over his fair skin. "It looks like wheat," he mumbled.

Astrid stared at him for a few seconds, ignoring the amused glances that passed between the others, then closed her mouth with a snap. "Oh," she said. "Thanks?" She smiled at him.

"Sure," he said, turning even pinker, and they beamed foolishly at each other until Sigyn took pity on them and made everyone help clear away the supper things.

Later that night, after everyone had left, she poked her head into David's room to check on him before going to bed. He looked up from the book he was reading for school— _Jane Eyre_ —and the notes he was taking with an unusually serious set to his mouth.

"Astrid," he said. "Are you happy?"

She blinked. "Yes, of course. Happier than I've been in a long time." She peered at him. "Are you?"

"Oh, yes." He smiled at her, but he still seemed oddly thoughtful. "I've been thinking, though, about Sigurd and what Thor said. And I think that sometimes, it's worth doing things even if they're hard, and even if you won't be able to forget after. Don't you think?"

"I—" Astrid stopped. She thought about it. She thought about it again. "Actually," she said slowly, "actually, David, I think you're right."

That night, she dreamt about standing in the rain with Thor, waiting for David to come back out of that burning building. When she woke up, she was smiling.

**Author's Note:**

> In Norse mythology, one of the most distinctive aspects of Thor's wife Sif was her golden hair, often symbolically associated with wheat.


End file.
